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‘I had an opportunity’: Jonny Wilkinson reveals how close he was to code switch

New teammates Jonny Wilkinson (L) and Andy Farrell of England look on during the RBS Six Nations championship match between England and Scotland at Twickenham on February 3, 2007 in London, England. (Photo by Shaun Botterill/Getty Images)

Jonny Wilkinson’s name will forever be associated with rugby union, but the legendary England fly-half had a surprising opportunity to make the leap to rugby league during his career.

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The 2003 World Cup winner was a guest on the Seven: Rob Burrow podcast this week, hosted by the Leeds Rhinos legend and his wife Lindsey, where he was asked whether he contemplated a code switch during his trophy-laden career.

Wilkinson revealed that he received an offer from Super League powerhouse Wigan Warriors one summer during his injury ravaged four years between 2003 and 2007.

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“I was injured for so long but I had a couple of opportunities,” the 44-year-old said.

“They were largely just there thrown out to help me out to say, ‘look, after your injuries, do you want to come and do a summer with us?’

“It was just a few months around the Wigan team at the time. And there was part of me that was like I’d love to go and find out.

“I always wondered: ‘Could I do it?’

“I always wondered if I could adapt, and I had an opportunity.”

While the majority of the rugby world would have been intrigued to see how the hard-tackling kicking machine fared in the other code, if only for a summer, he admitted that an injury during that time could have spelled the end of his career.

“The only issue was that had I reinjured, the rest of my career was gone. Clubs who employed me would never have let that go.”

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Though the move never came to fruition, Wilkinson described his love of rugby league on the podcast, and how he actually watches more league than union these days.

“It’s mad now,” the former World Rugby player of the year said.

“I probably watch more rugby league than I do rugby union, and it’s been like that for a long time.”

Wilkinson brushed shoulders with plenty of league greats during his England career, with Wigan legends Jason Robinson and Andy Farrell probably being the two biggest. He explained how he was “hugely inspired” by league and ex league players during his career, so much so that he persistently battled for the respect of his teammates.

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“I spent a lot of my time trying to impress those guys who came towards me,” he said.

“So like the Jasons [Robinson] and Andy Farrells, whenever I was next to them I was like I’ve got to do something so that they respect me.

“I love what the guys do. I love the fact that if you were to go take a ball it’s because you mean to score. And I do watch it now, constantly. I watch it all the time. If it’s on I find myself sat there going ‘oh, highlights of more Super League games or the NRL.”

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2 Comments
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Pecos 402 days ago

Then it would’ve been “Johnny who”? Since rugby went pro the only thing keeping league somewhat alive is the NRL.

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JW 4 hours ago
Does South Africa have a future in European competition?

I rated Lowe well enough to be an AB. Remember we were picking the likes of George Bridge above such players so theres no disputing a lot of bad decisions have been made by those last two coaches. Does a team like the ABs need a finicky winger who you have to adapt and change a lot of your style with to get benefit from? No, not really. But he still would have been a basic improvement on players like even Savea at the tail of his career, Bridge, and could even have converted into the answer of replacing Beauden at the back. Instead we persisted with NMS, Naholo, Havili, Reece, all players we would have cared even less about losing and all because Rieko had Lowe's number 11 jersey nailed down.


He was of course only 23 when he decided to leave, it was back in the beggining of the period they had started retaining players (from 2018 onwards I think, they came out saying theyre going to be more aggressive at some point). So he might, all of them, only just missed out.


The main point that Ed made is that situations like Lowe's, Aki's, JGP's, aren't going to happen in future. That's a bit of a "NZ" only problem, because those players need to reach such a high standard to be chosen by the All Blacks, were as a country like Ireland wants them a lot earlier like that. This is basically the 'ready in 3 years' concept Ireland relied on, versus the '5 years and they've left' concept' were that player is now ready to be chosen by the All Blacks (given a contract to play Super, ala SBW, and hopefully Manu).


The 'mercenary' thing that will take longer to expire, and which I was referring to, is the grandparents rule. The new kids coming through now aren't going to have as many gp born overseas, so the amount of players that can leave with a prospect of International rugby offer are going to drop dramatically at some point. All these kiwi fellas playing for a PI, is going to stop sadly.


The new era problem that will replace those old concerns is now French and Japanese clubs (doing the same as NRL teams have done for decades by) picking kids out of school. The problem here is not so much a national identity one, than it is a farm system where 9 in 10 players are left with nothing. A stunted education and no support in a foreign country (well they'll get kicked out of those countries were they don't in Australia).


It's the same sort of situation were NZ would be the big guy, but there weren't many downsides with it. The only one I can think was brought up but a poster on this site, I can't recall who it was, but he seemed to know a lot of kids coming from the Islands weren't really given the capability to fly back home during school xms holidays etc. That is probably something that should be fixed by the union. Otherwise getting someone like Fakatava over here for his last year of school definitely results in NZ being able to pick the cherries off the top but it also allows that player to develop and be able to represent Tonga and under age and possibly even later in his career. Where as a kid being taken from NZ is arguably going to be worse off in every respect other than perhaps money. Not going to develop as a person, not going to develop as a player as much, so I have a lotof sympathy for NZs case that I don't include them in that group but I certainly see where you're coming from and it encourages other countries to think they can do the same while not realising they're making a much worse experience/situation.

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